Chip, the All American Bus

Back in Trieste the city got under our skin. Camping was Italian style, free and safe. In Barcola, a small stylish resort just west of the main bay, we found an allocated area for campers in a large and very busy car park.
So had quite a few others, including Alan and Kay from the UK & Germano from Treviso. Germano spoke no English, us no Italian but we were soon laughing and sharing drink and dinner. His home brewed prosecco went down very well...

Barcola car park pitch (the damp tarmac gives the "camp" shower away.


Evening view across the marina and the bay behind from the hatch


New friends


Across the bay, towards Barcola from the castle


"standin' on a rooftop, tryin' to clear my mind"...


City parking. We chose to take the local bus.


and we booked the next step...

 

It was an early start! Stupid o'clock & I think we left the car park that had been our camp for 5 days at around 1am.
Incidentally, the solar panels mean't we could have stayed here for as long as the sun continued to shine, despite the heavy draw from the Westy fridge. A quality shakedown for what was to come...
Arriving at the ferry port we found it crawling with German travellers in a huge variety of camping vehicles, from desert prepared series Land Rovers to behemoth 6 wheel drive trucks with demountable cabins. It was too dark & we were too knack'd to take pics.

30 odd hours later we arrived at destination Igoumenitsa in north western Greece

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Close parking..


...so close in fact there was a lot of shouting, arguing and people squeezing themselves out of their windows.
I've never seen anything like it. We got out of the slider hehe.
I also removed the wing mirrors!


Dawn in the Adriatic


We were glad to get off. The ferry had already stopped at Corfu but the majority of travellers were going onwards to Patra.


Terra firma and the start of some awesome adventures...as if getting this far wasn't adventure enough!


On the road again in the land that has captured our hearts.

 

We followed the coast south from Igoumenitsa, stopping overnight at a small town named Syvota. Had an awesome night watching Greece play (& lose)! to Costa Rica in one of the tavernas & retired to our 'camp' in the centre of town on the main square!


Road out of Igoumenitsa


Syvota at night


Travelling on, our first Island is Lefkada. A small causeway guarded by an ancient castle forms the entrance to the island.

Lunch on Lefkada


Kathisma beach is a must visit! Amazing blue sea with strong breakers drew us into an afternoon of lounging around.


Had a couple of people drop in...


...and then asked a local taverna owner if we could stay over in their car park. Camping was strictly prohibited but with permission of the land owner...


Ionian sunset

 

@theBusmonkey. WOW!!! very jealous, looks like your having an amazing journey.

 

ha thanks Fil but that's last years efforts & I've been tardy in updating the thread.
We're being self indulgent posting warm & fuzzy memories but hopefully some of you will enjoy the pics.

As Mrs BM is starting to get excited about the next adventure & as it's cold & miserablish outside she's told me to get this completed!

 

Lefkada was a complete surprise. As I said, barely an island & not a massive touristy destination but very cool. As with much if the landscape in Greece, the island has a central spine of mountains. Some of the villages seem untouched by modern living with locals wearing traditional dress & cooking over open fires.
But onwards & southwards.


Our free camping is easy with the systems we pondered over for so long really coming into their own. The solar continues to give us freedom & the portable water containers gave us the flexibility to either fill up from water points or fill easily from mineral water bottles. Mineral water is about 0.9 cents per litre so we bought in bulk & topped the tanks up. Leisure gas is not an issue. We filled up once in Italy, having needed the propex in Austria, but now only using the hob & portable BBQ life is good.

Overnight on a beach just before crossing onto the Peloponnese.


Killini provided a few days stop-over by the side of the road! Locals are very relaxed so long as you're not daft & a small community of travellers came
& went while we were there. Beach showers made keeping things sanitary easy & eating where the locals do mean't we felt we were slowly immersing ourselves but also kept costs down.

Evening sunshine after a day on the beach.


Rather than just travel the main roads we try & get off the beaten track. It was melon season & this major crop was occupying a lot of local time & effort.


& of course you get to see local life. Temp was a lowly 35!


Chlemoutsi Caslte is an awesome 13C medieval castle close to Killini & a little further down the road we stumbled on the remnants of old Roman baths.

Locals are savvy & avoiding the horrific Killini Beach millionaires resort, they just slather themselves in the volcanic mud for free!
Over 10 years ago we camped on Killini beach with nothing else but the company of a herd of goats. Now it's all developed, gated access, big money only.



Turning inland, we headed for Olympia. The landscape changes and the mountains become more of feature.
Our top tip for visiting these sites is to go late afternoon. Most of the coaches have left & it's a lot cooler but more on timings later...

On the road to the sanctuary

 

Not a massively OTT welcome to one of the most thought provoking UNESCO heritage centres in the world.
Ah well it's only been there for 3000 years so there is room for improvement
The small town is big on tourist tat but the locals have to make a living. The site itself is awesome & TBH I could bore you all with 4 or 5 full posts of pictures & wordy carp. I won't...

The road in


The tourist strip, but it's not Vegas is it


The sanctuary is really well presented. Reworked for the 2004 Olympics it consists of an undercover museum complex which houses the most delicate antiquities and the outside space. The outside spaces are well signed and interpreted despite an initial random phase of building and development in the 10C BC. Much of what remains is 4th century to Roman & very impressive. It's a reflective place that causes you to just sit & think...





& for us a precious moment capturing a Chinese tourist party lining up to sprint in the Stadium


The car park was empty when we came out. No problem, we've not booked a campsite so we'll stay here! Wrong.
See the small blue sign to the right with the tent on it. No camping! We knew this but didn't think it would be enforced. It was but the police waited until 11.45pm to tell us. Despite several drive-bys through the evening they waited. The blue lights & siren woke us up & we were politely asked to leave. This was the only time it happened but the moral here is, don't drink when free camping & be polite to gun carrying police officers.

 

The only option was to drive to the coast. Well it seemed like it at midnight, so we got the hell out of there!
After an hour & a half or so & a couple of misfires re parking up (we have a rule that if one of us isn't happy we move on with no questions or arguments) we settled in a small car park. Breakfast was had in the local taverna & normal service resumed.

A nice place to awake. Kakovatos. But arriving at 01.30 was not ideal.


However, undaunted we decided to visit another "off the beaten track" temple later that morning. This is the Temple of Apollo at Bassae. Holy schmoley was this place remote. We went from sea level to 1131m in a couple of slow hours, rarely getting out of second let alone third.


No problem, nice gentle climb


Local fire station. Gazebo, cool view and a Unimog. What a job.


Local town. The only town! Bread & BBQ meat, water & veg procured. Beach ball anyone?



Ah!


mmm!


Ah!


Baby baby don't look back


The remoteness is breathtaking & well worth shortening the life of the clutch, brakes & us.
The question remains why the ancients built here & how!

 

Cool pics!

 

awesome trip! great pics!

 

The Temple of Apollo Epikourios is an amazing structure. I've put a link in for those of you that are interested in such stuff.
It's literally in the middle of nowhere & appears as a huge tented structure as you round a bend. Due to the inaccessibility it is not overrun with tourist parties. I continually ask how they did this with such accuracy. Breathtaking.


The restoration is equally impressive with the engineers using cranes and hydraulics to reset the columns.


Back down at the coast another beach was home for the night.


And then a trip to a campsite. This time Camping Tholo to catch up with the laundry.
Here we made some new friends in a young Swiss couple. Cool campers & a cool rig. He picked the old BMW up for a few hundred euro & did all the resto himself.

 

This bit of the coast is much more sedate travelling than the road from Patra to Tholo. The 'new' road that is being constructed gives way to gentle curves, tractors and the odd bay.
We took our time. Overnighting where we felt like it, Lagkouvardos being a memorable evening behind a cool pop-up surf bar. A detour inland to Chora found Nestors Palace closed for restoration (it's only been there for 3200 years & will probably still be there in a couple more) but it didn't matter as the driving's good.
It took us a couple of easy days to get down to Methoni. An amazingly well preserved Venetian castle dominates the bay.

 

After the Turks pinched Methoni castle from the Venetians they added a prison


and were fairly keen not to let anyone in so heavily fortified the entrance with a big moat and little bridge


Inside, the castle is huge. All this would have contained buildings and life


Camping Methoni has most of the beach so rather than pee them off by free camping we drove a couple of clicks round the bay & rocked up at another beach taverna.
A quick bob inside to ask for permission & another lovely spot was secured for the night.
I decided to have a peek at the NS rear wheel which occasionally knocked whilst rounding bends. We'd done a lot of bends up to this point.

The hub nut was loose! With the split pin still in the castellated nut!
How does that happen, it's supposed to be torqued to a billion lbs/ft/in & usually takes 12 men pushing on an RSJ to move it.
Anyway, we have our theories....

Tyre off in the shade of a small tool box



I tapped the only thing holding the rear wheel on the bus back round with my toffee hammer and small punch, collected Mrs BM from the beach, & we went for a Mythos.


Really...


We'll get it properly tightened tomorrow, maybe...

 

Love a good road trip

 

So jealous want to do the same one day

 

Love the photos, a real winter-cheer-me-up.

 

How much did you spend on fuel on these trips ?

 

Hahhahahhaahaahahaha & ha!
That's me laughing nervously marmite monster.

The trip above ( & I really must update the thread with some more pics) was 145 days so nearly 5 months.
We did, & Mrs Monkey will correct me, fractionally over 7000 miles.
Our fuel consumption is between 17.5 (when the caliper rubs!!) to 22mpg.
We budget on spending about 1k sterling a month and just under half of that works out in fuel costs. It would be cheaper doing it this year as we were paying up to 1.8 euro per litre in Italy
Somewhere between 2 & 2.5k sterling as a rough guestimate but there are more smiles per mile doing this than anything else....
...so it's worth it

 

Solid man maths I like it